dual boot

“After The Software Wars”, is a new book in which former Microsoft employee Keith Curtis explores the worlds of proprietary and free software. Quoting from the article:

While I came to not be all that thrilled with Fedora itself, I was floored merely by the installation process. It contained a graphical installer that ran all the way to completion, it resized my NTFS partition — which I considered a minor miracle, setup dual boot, and actually did boot, and let me surf the Web. I didn’t have a clue what to do next, but the mere fact that this all worked told me more about the potential of Linux than anything I had read so far. You cannot, by accident, build an airplane that actually flies.

If you cannot get rid of Windows due to application software compatibility issues, try andLinux.

Linux does everything that many users want it to, but some people have tasks that require Windows applications. You can dual-boot both operating systems, or run Windows in a virtualized environment on Linux. Alas, virtualization makes the guest OS almost useless for processor- and RAM-intensive tasks like editing videos and playing games. Now, a Ubuntu-based distro called andLinux takes cooperation with Windows to a whole new level.

This software is must if you dual boot between Linux and Windows laptop / desktop computer.

I’ve already written about Explore2fs and other programs to grant read and write access to Linux ext3 partitions / files from a Windows box. There is a new program called Linux Reader which allows safe and quick access to alternative file systems. This program plays the role of a bridge between your Windows and Ext2/Ext3 Linux file systems. This easy-to-use tool runs under Windows and allows you to browse Ext2/Ext3 Linux file systems and extract files from there. From the project home page:

First of all, DiskInternals Linux Reader is absolutely free. Secondly, the program provides for read-only access and does not allow you to make records in Ext2/Ext3 file system partitions. This guarantees that the interference in an alterative file system will not affect the work of Linux later. Apart from this, it is necessary to note, that it gives you an opportunity to use common Windows Explorer for extracting data. A preview option for pictures is one more pleasant point, which is worth mentioning.

Q. I would like to know – can I access Linux ext3 partitions from windows 2000 server (dual boot) or windows XP desktop, as I have tons of MP3 and video files downloaded under Linux.

A. It is true that you can easily access your Windows partitions from Linux. However with small free utility called Explore2fs you can easily access Linux ext3 or ext2 partitions too without any problem.

Does ext3 work with windows?

Short answer – Yes.

You can always get your favorite MP3/video or PDF file stored inside Linux ext3 file system. This utility works on

Windows 95

Windows 98

Windows ME

Windows NT 4.0

Windows 2000

Windows XP

Windows Server 2003

However please note that I don’t recommend to install this utility on a production Linux serer (if you have one) as it does not enforce security permission from windows operating system.One more thing before using this utility make sure you have a backup of all important data.

Download Explore2fs

=> You can download Explore2fs, the WIN32 explorer for Linux ext2fs partitions here.

Read and Write access to Linux file system from Windows

As pointed out by Anonymous user you can use Ext2 Installable File System For Windows, which provide Complete reading and writing access to files and directories of volumes with the Ext2 or Ext3 file system. You can download the software here.